


Stone gods

by Shepard_Shakedown



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M, The Blight (Dragon Age), Titans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-28
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-07-18 15:54:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16121810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shepard_Shakedown/pseuds/Shepard_Shakedown
Summary: The red lyrium had grown like a giants spiders nest. They sprouted out of every surface. Pushing stone and rock aside. They’d have been beautiful if their song didn't feel so wrong. She wasn't the only one that had noticed. Apart from her dog she hadn't seen a single animal in over an hour; chased off by the discordant song. Normal lyrium did the opposite.





	1. Into The Abyss

It had been years since the blight. Years since the darkspawn attacks on Amaranthine. Months since her companions; Her friends had seen her. She’d cut off contact with the wardens for the most part. It was just her and her dog. She let Zevran check in. But the last one had been at least a month ago. It was wearing her thin.

 

She missed him and his snark. She missed the sex. She missed the way he looked at her as if she was something blessed. As if it was a miracle that a grumpy ex-carta member thought he was worth it. She did of course. He cared deeply when he let himself and that was precious to her. She was glad shed ignored the gut instinct to end him at their first meeting. The stone had ingrained practicality in her. An alive assassin on their side was useful.

 

But not right now. Right now she was ass deep in darkspawn chasing rumors based on a report that a warden had been cured of the blight. It was a headache. Worth it if she could confirm any of it. But a headache. The warden report she was chasing hadn't happened anywhere near where she was but it was similar. And more importantly nowhere near Orzammar. 

 

She could hear the whispers of the stone guiding her forward; Telling her if she turned left there was a way and right would lead to death. Rica hadn't understood but Sigrun had. The stone spoke fainter for some and it had answers further in. 

 

Lyrium had its own song that resonated through the stone. A ethereal humming that sang clearer the purer it was. She heard it before she saw it and then she felt the song waver. Blue veins stretching through abandoned halls turned red and the sweet song rang out discordant. It felt wrong but familiar. Blighted. 

 

The song called out beneath the blight calling her but the blight itself… Any one who replied would be blighted. A wounded animal that screamed for aid but would always attack the hand that helped. 

 

She’d always known the stone had a heart but seeing it corrupted. This was wrong. The stone was wrong here. She’d felt it when she entered the thaig. Now she knew what it was. She fought deeper into the thaig. She was avoiding most of the darkspawn letting the blight guide her as much as the stone but there was something else. She could feel the blight clinging to something too smart to be a darkspawn. 

 

Her dog whined restless near the singing stone. They were both on edge. She hear the shuffling of the blighted nearby. Their footsteps too sure, too even to be ghouls; Their pattern humanoid. Blighted but not blighted enough to read. She gripped her daggers tighter waiting for their first move. They would make the first move. 

 

The roads of the thaig had crumbled into a loose tunel system leading her deeper. It wound through spires of red. There more the further she went always singing louder. Then something bigger. 

 

The darkspawn stopped appearing. The further in the less appeared until they stopped completely. She could still feel the blight. The stone itself screamed with it. Shed struggled to explain it to Ohgren and Sigrun when they’d traveled. They knew the stone but their connection to it had never been as strong. The blight was new to them too. Between the blight and stone she’d felt most at home in the deep roads. But she wasn’t about to curse Zevran to that life. 

 

The first of the blighted came at the darkest part of the roads. She’d long since broken off the paths traversing well worn tunnels instead. They weren't ghouls but the blight had soaked through them completely. They were dwarven or at least had been if their armor and stature was anything to go by. 

 

She pulled a helmet free from one of the corpses feeling the rip of skin that had fused to it. The red tinge of the blighted lyrium glowed both within the helmet and in what was left of the dwarfs face. She’d seen it in templars before. Enough lyrium over the years and your veins started to crystalize with it. If you were pale enough you could see the glow. This was different. The lyrium had grown through the skin.

 

It was the blights influence on lyrium she suspected. Lyrium had always been volatile and dangerous. Adding the blight to it would likely bring out the worst in it. An already dangerous power corrupted. An inspection of the rest of him had suggested she was right. The deceased dwarf had fused to his armor. The others had been the same. It explained the feel of the blight but not how they weren't ghouls. She’d likely have to take the information back to vigils keep for answers. Aeternus would want to know. 

 

The blighted were harder to avoid further in. They’d watched her arrived and they hadn't lost sight of her for long. The further in the more she felt surrounding her. She kept to the narrower paths as much as she could. It was easier to fight when she could control how many. It was a tactic she used when darkspawn swarmed. The blighted hadn't seemed to realize that. It didn’t really matter. Her tactics had to change soon. 

 

The tunnels opened up converging on one road. It was a similar layout to orzamars thaig gates and the ones to the cadash and caridin thaigs. Dwarves were nothing if not predictable. She’d aspired to change that. 

 

The red lyrium had grown like a giants spiders nest. They sprouted out of every surface. Pushing stone and rock aside. They’d have been beautiful if their song didn't feel so wrong. She wasn't the only one that had noticed. Apart from her dog she hadn't seen a single animal in over an hour; chased off by the discordant song. Normal lyrium did the opposite.

 

She pushed further in. There was a rhythm in the stone she was following now. It was weak and uneven like a dying beasts heartbeat but it was there.


	2. Kill your gods

Her dog whimpered the further in they got; Part from the exhaustion, part from unease. The rhythm of the stone had stopped being a feeling a while ago. It shook the crumbling paths they’d walked guiding them towards the source. Leading them towards something bigger than she could imagine.

 

The gate when they reached it was crumbling but intact. Still guarding some lost thaig nameless and forgotten. It was as held together by red veins as it was held ajar. The blighted had pulled back likely expecting her to pass through. But she wasn't planning on it.

 

There was a different path through a crack in the wall further to the left of the gate guarded by half the people she felt through the main gate. She didn't plan on fighting an army.

 

The side path overlooked the gate confirming what she already knew. The blighted patrolled lyrium addled streets. The caves had opened up; The ceiling tall was enough she could barely see it. What she could see was the red glow of blighted lyrium twisting spires down stone pillars. The whole thaig was lit up in a glow of red. She could feel the sickness in the stone.

 

The further in they ventured the more blighted lyrium had begun to consume buildings. Even the blighted soldiers had become scarce as she narrowed in on the source of the stones song. 

 

What blighted she did find had long since been claimed by the red lyrium. Some had fused to walls convulsing as the stone swallowed them. Others had it growing out of armor tougher and long past any sanity they might have had once. They were careless and angry. 

 

The road split at a pool of red. Lyrium like everywhere else branched down like the roots of a tree into the pool. Unlike everywhere else it appeared to drip. There were factures along the veins that oozed it like a syrup. The pool itself sang with the corrupted song. 

 

Above the pool was what looked like crystal heart. Pulsing lyrium that rattled the whole of the cave. Beautiful and sick. She could hear the clattering of armour on the stones behind her as the blighted found her. Lead by the heart or by her own tracks? She didn't know.

 

She walked towards the crystal each step demanded she submit. It was unlike the call of the archdemon in that it didn't just call for the blight but also her very being. She resisted the thoughts in her head to cut through the blighted. She feel the ache of the song trying to wear her down. It was alive like a heart. No. It was a heart.

 

Her feet kicked over cups and jugs that were scattered around and it dawned on her just what they were doing with pool; With oozing crystal. They’d drunk of tainted lyrium, the blood of whatever creature shed stumbled into. It corrupted them like everything else the blight touched. 

 

Lyrium twisted in and out of the crystal anchoring it to the area around it. It pulsed with the pained rhythm of the dying beast sustained by the magic that was killing it. It seemed like it was at and unending war with itself. 

 

The red crystal pulsed again sending out a wave of magic that called more blighted than she'd fought since the blight. Seemingly never ending waves of warriors desperate to keep her from this. The heart of a beast bigger than she could fathom. When had she even crossed into it?

 

She took a chance during a break in the fighting. She jammed a dagger into one of the veins leading into it and twisted it. The vein shattered and the rhythm stuttered. Mercy was better than whatever pained existence this thing led. She shattered another vein. Her dog whined as she continued the red oozing lyrium soaking through her armour. 

 

Leaving the caves was easier. The heart of the stone shattered and her purpose there gone. It felt hollow. The beast wasn’t completely dead it didn’t seem so easily killed. But she’d destroyed part of it and the cult within. She wasn’t any closer to a cure and the road was far from over. But it was a start, of what time would tell. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading. this fic took way too long. i got stuck on how i wanted to end it and despite having most of it written when i posted the first part it ended up taking this long. feel free to leave a comment, kudos, or a complaint below and have a great day.


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